


Scars

by zelda_zee



Category: Lost
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-25
Updated: 2013-08-25
Packaged: 2017-12-24 13:50:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/940717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zelda_zee/pseuds/zelda_zee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If Sawyer had been one of the Oceanic Six.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Scars

Sawyer is in Grand Cayman, just tidying up some investments, looking after the savings that had survived the reports of his untimely demise, safely socked away under a false identity. Sawyer’s not conning anymore but that doesn’t mean he’s planning on returning any of his ill-gotten gains, and then there’s the Oceanic settlement to look after as well. Oceanic flies him to the Caymans for free – flies him anywhere for free – puts him up at the Ritz in a luxury suite with a view of Seven Mile Beach and all the trappings of wealth that he doesn’t much care about anymore.

He comes in late, a little buzzed from one too many martinis, fumbles the key card and has to try again. In the entry he pauses, hearing how the silence is too loud, the emptiness of the room too full, the cool air just a few degrees too warm. The hairs on the back of his neck rise and his heart pounds. He reaches for his gun before remembering that he no longer carries one.

He creeps cautiously forward into the dark room and sees a man standing at the window with his back to him, looking out at the sea, clearly not afraid, not trying to hide. For a moment Sawyer freezes as he takes in long, dark hair, the square set of the shoulders, the way he looks taller than he is simply by the way he holds himself. He knows that silhouette, that coiled stillness, the tension that is evident along the line of every limb, but in the half-second before the man speaks, there’s no name, just _him_.

“Sawyer,” Sayid says, turning to face him and Sawyer’s heart stutters when he sees how he’s changed, the shock of it rendering him momentarily speechless. “I apologize for surprising you like this.”

Sawyer doesn’t tell him that no one calls him that anymore. He switches on the light and stares silently because his mind is too busy trying to process Sayid in an expensive dark blue suit, black silk shirt open at the collar and his hair falling in thick, gentle waves around a face that looks the same and yet not. He can’t place what it is about him that’s changed. But something has, something beyond the absence of tank top and khakis and unruly curls.

“Sayid.” His voice comes out rough, sounding as if he hasn’t spoken in days. “What the –”

“Yes, I know,” Sayid interrupts with a little smile. Sawyer thinks Sayid’s voice is pitched differently than he remembers, a little softer, smoother, not as clipped. Quiet, as if he’s trying to soothe. “A shock, I am sure. Again, I apologize.” After a second’s pause he adds. “I mean you no harm.”

Sawyer snorts at that. “Didn’t cross my mind that you did.” Sayid doesn’t exactly flinch at that but Sawyer sees something in his face tighten. “Look at you,” he smirks, shaking his head in wonder. “Who’d a thought you’d clean up like that, back on the island?” He supposes he should ask about Sayid breaking into his room, be affronted or something, but he finds he doesn’t really care. He’s more curious about how Sayid found him and why.

Sayid nods at him. “And you as well.” Sawyer glances down at himself. Gray slacks and a tight black t-shirt, nothing special, but he figures it’s probably a big change from the island.

“How’d you find me?” Sawyer asks, coming into the room. When he gets closer he catches a scent, something woodsy. Cologne. He never would have imagined that Sayid would wear cologne.

”It was not hard,” Sayid says.

Sawyer starts at that, because he’s been trying to fly under the radar. He hasn’t had contact with anyone from the island or before, goes under an alias, avoids places that have any association with who he once was. He knows there are people out there still fighting the same fight, forces at work that he wants nothing to do with. Maybe that makes him a coward, but he doesn’t care. He just does everything he can not to think about it. Drawing attention to himself would be suicide, trying to stand up to those forces would be suicide, trying to go back would be suicide. He keeps his head low and focuses on getting through one day and then the next. It’s just like it’s always been for him. He’s surviving, any way he can.

“It was not hard for _me_ ,” Sayid amends when he sees the stricken look on Sawyer’s face.

“What's that s'posed to mean?”

“Never mind. No one else will find you, Sawyer, until you decide you want to be found.” Sayid comes to stand very close to him, too close, looking up into his face. Sawyer feels the wrongness of it ping every nerve. “I will make certain of that.” Sayid says it as if Sawyer is under his protection, and Sawyer frowns at him because none of this is making any sense at all.

“I don’t get why you’re here, Sayid. Not that I’m not happy to see you.” He flushes as soon as it’s out of his mouth, because he meant it to be sarcastic and instead it sounds distressingly sincere. “And I’m – I’ve only been here a day, I still don’t see how you found me. Is there – is something wrong?”

Sayid smiles or grimaces, Sawyer’s not sure which. There’s a bitter twist to his mouth that Sawyer doesn’t remember seeing there before. “Is something wrong,” he murmurs, as if he’s speaking to himself. He chuckles and the sound of it throws Sawyer, because he’s not sure why Sayid would think that’s funny.

“Nothing is wrong, Sawyer,” Sayid says, his voice clear and smooth again. “What could possibly be wrong? We made it back, we are rich, we have the world at our fingertips, our whole lives stretching ahead of us, free and clear. How could anything be wrong?” He smiles and it looks like a challenge. “May I have a drink? Scotch?”

“Sure.” Sawyer goes to the bar and pulls out a bottle, grateful for something to do, some way to keep his hands busy. He glances up at Sayid. “Thought you didn’t drink.”

“Oh.” Sayid shrugs. “Yes. Well. I am not a very good Muslim, you know. Never was.” Sawyer cocks an eyebrow at him. He remembers Sayid praying on the island and maybe he had never come across as particularly spiritual kind of guy, but at least back then he was going through the motions. “After we were rescued I finally gave up on it entirely.”

“I sucked at being a Baptist,” Sawyer said, handing Sayid a glass of amber liquid. “That’s what I was baptized. It never really took, though god knows I got Scripture beat into me often enough.”

Sayid raises his eyebrows at this and Sawyer reddens slightly. He’s never said anything about his past to Sayid before.

“So really, Sayid, how’d you find me?” Sawyer asks, because it’s bothering him like an itch he can’t scratch. If Sayid could find him so easily, then surely he isn’t the only one.

Sayid sighs and for a second Sawyer thinks he’s really going to tell him, but then he just says, “Stop using names from novels, Sawyer. Tom Joad? Even I know that one. Or at least pick obscure books or books that have not been made into films. There is no point in making it easy for them.”

That’s not the full answer and Sawyer knows it, but he lets it go.

“Okay,” he says. “Point taken.” He wonders if people who hadn’t seen him sitting day after day with his nose in a book would be able to make the connection Sayid did, but it doesn’t really matter. In the future he’ll be more cautious. “Now, why don’t you tell me what you’re doin’ here? Or did you just follow me to the Caymans for old times’ sake?” He leans forward, elbows on the bar. Sayid removes his jacket and hangs it on the back of a bar stool opposite, then takes a seat. Sawyer likes having the expanse of smooth granite between them. It feels safer this way, though he’s not sure why. Sayid is not here to hurt him, he feels certain of that, but there’s something about him that makes Sawyer nervous. Sayid has always seemed dangerous, it’s one of the first things you notice about him, but this is different. It’s something inside, something just slightly off that Sawyer can’t put his finger on.

“I was in the neighborhood, as it happens,” Sayid says. Sawyer laughs in disbelief and Sayid allows a smile to flicker briefly over his face. “It is true, whether you believe it or not. I have business here.”

“Business,” Sawyer states flatly.

“Yes, business. A great deal of business is conducted in the Caymans or didn't you know that?”

“What kind of business are you in?” Sawyer asks. Sayid has money, they all do. No need to work ever again.

Sayid waves a hand dismissively. “Ah, it is boring. An investment that has not paid the dividends promised. I am here to look into it. To fix it.” He takes a sip of scotch, then meets Sawyer’s eyes. He had forgotten how dark Sayid’s eyes are, how deep and shining. How difficult to read. “Nothing of importance, believe me, other than that it brought me here at the same time as you.”

Sawyer finishes his scotch and pours another. He should slow down. The scotch is going straight to his head and on top of the martinis from earlier he’s beginning to feel thoroughly drunk.

“Quite a coincidence,” Sawyer says. He stares at Sayid’s hand, curled around his glass. Long, slender fingers, no rings, the white line of a scar curving around his thumb. A new scar, still slightly reddened at one end, where the line is thicker and more gnarled. Sawyer knows Sayid’s hands. He’s seen them often enough, fiddling with gadgetry and weapons. He’s acquired this scar since the island.

“How’d you get this?” Sawyer asks. He traces the line with a forefinger before he thinks better of it. It surprises him to feel Sayid’s hand shake.

“Cooking. I forgot that the knife was sharp.” It’s a blatant lie and Sawyer’s eyes snap to Sayid’s face, but his gaze is focused on his hand where Sawyer’s finger is rubbing absently back and forth over the scar. Sawyer suddenly wonders what other scars Sayid has accrued since he’s seen him last and it dawns on him that he’d like to find out, like to strip Sayid of his expensive suit, and with it of his lies and his deceptions and his new, suave persona. He’d like to see him totally bare and exposed and see if he could find the man he’d known, the fierce, hot-headed warrior who’d unexpectedly turned out to be one of the only people on that island Sawyer had felt that he could trust.

He wraps his hand around Sayid’s wrist and watches his throat move as he swallows. He can feel Sayid’s pulse flutter beneath his skin. “Bullshit,” he says quietly and Sayid’s lip twitches into a quizzical smile.

“It is so inconceivable that I would cook? I was a chef once, you know. I am quite capable of preparing a meal.”

“Okay,” Sawyer allows. “But this?” he runs his finger over the scar again. Then he turns Sayid’s hand palm upward. There’s another scar that slices across the fleshy part beneath the thumb and one that follows his life line. “Not from cooking. Defensive. Someone was comin’ at you with a knife.”

Sayid blinks at him, his face absolutely still, showing no emotion, which is how Sawyer knows he’s right. “Who you fightin’ these days, Sayid? I would‘ve thought you’d have left your fightin’ days behind by now. Haven’t you had enough of that?”

The air crackles with tension but Sawyer doesn’t relinquish his hold. Sayid looks utterly calm. He’s not even sweating, but Sawyer can feel his pulse kicking against the pad of his finger, fast and frantic.

Then Sayid laughs self-deprecatingly and gently pulls his hand away. “It was very clumsy of me. I must confess that I had had too much too drink. Not a good idea before chopping onions.” He turns smoothly away and walks to the door that leads out onto a small balcony. “Do you mind if we go out? I’d like a cigarette.” He smiles politely, but doesn’t wait for Sawyer to agree, just pushes open the door and walks to the railing.

Sawyer follows him out and watches as he lights up.

“Drinkin’ _and_ smokin’ now, Sayid? No thanks,” he says, when Sayid offers him the pack.

Sayid takes a drag, closes his eyes as he savors it. “Yes,” he sighs as he exhales. “I am quite fallen these days. Sins aplenty.” He leans forward, elbows on the railing. “I recall you smoking in our first days on the island.” He glances sideways at Sawyer. “You never returned to the habit?”

“Hell, no. Too fuckin’ hard to quit. Once was enough, believe me.” He’d been tempted, when he got back. But he hadn’t given in. He needed some outward sign that there was something about him that had changed.

“Very wise,” Sayid nods. Then, after a moment. “I do not plan to quit.”

Sawyer raises his eyebrows. “Ever? Those things’ll kill you, you know.”

“Perhaps.” Sayid straightens and surveys the lights of the line of hotels marching up the beach before turning his attention to the quiet, moon-dappled sea. “Oceanic certainly does not skimp. Your view is breathtaking.”

Sawyer turns, facing away from it and rests the small of his back against the railing, folding his arms and watching Sayid. There’s a warm breeze coming off the water and it lifts his hair slightly. It gleams in the darkness and Sawyer wishes he could just reach out and touch it.

For a moment, the night, the smell of the sea, the gentle wind is so reminiscent of the island that Sawyer is hit with a wave of melancholy nostalgia, but he forces it away, trying not to give in to that now. “Ocean view,” he says dryly. “I can’t exactly find it in me to get too excited about that.”

Sayid looks at him and smiles and there’s a flash of understanding that passes between them. Sawyer sees that the melancholy has infected him too, or maybe it was already there. Sayid always was a moody little fucker. At any rate, it suddenly feels good to be with someone who understands, someone he can be himself with.

“I think,” he says, not letting himself plan what he's about to say or he’ll never get it out. “I think it's like soldiers in wartime, no offense. Like combat soldiers in the same platoon or something. Afterwards, it’s like they’re the only ones who really _know_. Is that – do you think that’s…?” He trails off, not knowing how to ask, not sure if Sayid will comprehend what he’s trying to say.

“Yes.” Sayid flicks the butt away and watches the ember fall, then looks him straight in the eye. “Yes. It is very much like that, Sawyer.”

Sawyer nods, relieved that he got it right. “No one knows. I don’t – I keep to myself, pretty much. Don’t talk about it, not to anyone, ever. Couldn’t.”

“No.” Sayid’s voice is barely a murmur.

“It’s kinda –” What he wants to say is _lonely_ , because it is. He’s never been so lonely in his life, and he’s led a fucking lonely life. “Weird,” is what he finishes with instead. His eyes flick to Sayid to gauge his response. Sayid looks like he’s waiting for Sawyer to continue, so he does. “I feel – disconnected, I guess. Off-balance. Sort of like –” He sighs in frustration. “I just don’t see the _point_ anymore.”

“And what was the point before?” Sayid asks.

Sawyer chuckles humorlessly. He gives Sayid a long, considering look. “There was a point. A lousy point, but there was one. I wanted revenge on someone. Someone who deserved it. Planned it for a long – for a _really_ long time. He was –” but suddenly his throat closes up and he can’t go on. Even now, he can’t put it behind him enough to talk about it.

“And?” Sayid is watching him levelly, missing nothing, and Sawyer struggles to get himself under control. “This revenge is…?”

“I took care of it,” Sawyer says shortly.

“I see.” Sayid doesn’t say anything further and Sawyer’s not sure whether he gets it – what Sawyer did to ‘take care of it’, but he thinks maybe he does.

“But there’s –” Sawyer’s voice drops and Sayid leans in to hear him. “That’s not all. What about _them_? Back there? We should – don’t you think we should –”

Sayid reaches out and lays a finger across Sawyer’s lips. He shakes his head and Sawyer falls silent. Sayid leans closer and speaks into Sawyer’s ear and even though he’s barely an inch away Sawyer has to strain to hear him.

“We cannot,” Sayid whispers and Sawyer suddenly thinks about listening devices and how the Others had everything bugged back on the island and how it was Oceanic who booked this room for him. “We cannot speak of it.” Sayid’s breath, warm and smelling of scotch, sends chills over his skin. “Not here. Do not – Sawyer, there is nothing we can do. Please do not try anything. Tell me you will not.”

“I – no,” he whispers into Sayid’s ear. His hair brushes Sawyer’s face. So soft. “No, I wouldn’t. Not on my own. But dammit, Sayid. I can’t forget. I try, but I can’t. Can you?”

“No,” Sayid breathes and he leans forward slightly, almost as if he needs Sawyer there to support him. “Not even for a moment.”

They’re standing so close that Sawyer can feel the heat of Sayid’s body, can smell how his cologne blends with the scent of him, a scent that makes Sawyer want to pull Sayid closer, that’s urging him to bury his face in Sayid’s neck and inhale. It’s this incongruous intimacy and the relief of being understood and how Sayid is hiding something and how Sawyer wants to make him reveal it – it’s all working on him in strange ways. Things were always far too complicated with Sayid for there to have been attraction between them, or rather, for there to have been anything _more_ than attraction, but now Sawyer is surprising himself by suddenly _wanting_ with a clarity and strength that he hasn’t felt for a very long time.

“We have to do something.” Sawyer’s face is turned into Sayid’s hair. He reaches up and wraps a hand around Sayid’s arm. He’s all muscle, hard and sinewy. Sawyer remembers these arms, bared to the sun, turning darker and darker as the weeks wore on.

“We cannot,” Sayid sighs. There is a strange note in his voice. One Sawyer doesn’t recognize. “Not – not now, Sawyer.” His weight rests against Sawyer a little more, as if Sayid is measuring Sawyer’s reaction to the contact and gradually increasing it when he doesn’t protest.

“Then when?” Sawyer asks, his voice rising slightly. Sayid shushes him. “When?” he repeats, in a whisper this time.

“I do not know. I wish – but,” Sayid drops his forehead to Sawyer’s shoulder. “I do not know.” Sawyer recognizes what it was he hears in Sayid’s voice. It’s defeat, and it sounds so wrong coming from Sayid. In all the time on the island, no matter how bad things got, he never heard Sayid admit defeat. He always strove and fought and struggled and he never once gave up. It sends a chill through Sawyer to think that maybe he’s given up now.

“I do not know,” Sayid whispers again. They stand quietly for a moment, leaning into each other, not quite embracing. Sawyer thinks it must look odd, but it feels right and somehow necessary.

“Sayid.” Sawyer turns his head so that his lips brush Sayid’s ear with every word. He feels Sayid shiver. He speaks very quietly. “What’s wrong? Don’t lie to me. There’s something wrong.”

Sayid’s hand touches his chest, just lightly, the fingertips resting there. “Everything is wrong,” Sayid replies, in that same hopeless voice, pitched low. “Do not ask me, Sawyer. I can only tell you lies. There is no more truth left in me.”

“I don’t believe that,” Sawyer says, tightening his grip on Sayid’s arm. He wants to shake Sayid, to snap him out of it, turn him back into the arrogant, argumentative, annoying fuck he was on the island. But he doesn’t, he just pulls him a little closer. Sayid’s hand goes to his arm, his right one, his fingers trailing over the muscle of his bicep and it takes Sawyer a moment to realize that they’re searching for something, until they find it, the scar that Sayid put there. Sawyer’s indrawn breath sounds loud in the quiet and he knows Sayid must feel how his arm trembles. Sayid touches it gently, carefully, tracing over it back and forth, again and again. He’s never touched it before. It feels electrifying to have Sayid’s fingers there where he had plunged in the blade that almost ended Sawyer’s life.

Sawyer’s breath stutters and he closes his eyes. There’s a sweet ache inside him that’s glowing warmly in his belly and migrating slowly lower and he can tell himself that it’s just the alcohol or the fact that he hasn’t been this close to a man in far too long or that it’s the uneasy tension that was between them for the months that they were on the island finally reaching its logical conclusion, but if he’s honest he has to say that despite how this new incarnation of Sayid rings false to him, there’s a raw, wounded honesty between them that’s twisting him up inside and turning his thoughts around and making him want some kind of unmistakable connection, something more than just words.

He sighs and lets it wash over him, parts his lips and turns his head, ready to let whatever it is that wants to happen, happen. But Sayid moves away, as if he senses what Sawyer’s thinking. He takes a step back and stands looking at Sawyer, conflict written all over his face, and again Sawyer wonders why Sayid is here. He thinks maybe Sayid wants something from him, something that he’s decided not to take.

“Sometimes I think about you, Sawyer,” Sayid says quietly. “I think about how I wanted to kill you. You are the last person who I truly _wanted_ to kill.”

Sawyer snorts and rolls his eyes. “I’m honored.”

Sayid continues as if he hasn’t heard him. “I think about how I wanted you dead and yet you are still alive.” He runs a tentative finger along the scar again and goose bumps rise on Sawyer’s skin. There’s a small, sad smile on Sayid’s lips and his eyes shine suspiciously for a moment. “I am thankful for that. Sometimes it is all I can find to be thankful for.”

Sawyer swallows at that. Before tonight he’d never have imagined that Sayid thought of him in that way, that’d he’d have thought about that day at all.

“Promise me you will stay alive, Sawyer.” Sayid’s voice is low and intense and he is looking at him very directly. There’s a lot going on in his eyes, in his expression. Sawyer can’t read it all, beyond the sadness and a kind of pleading desperation. “I need to know that you will be all right. That there was one time when I made a mistake and things did not end for the worst.”

“Okay,” Sawyer can think of a hundred ways to make light of the situation, but he holds back. It feels awkward and too serious, but the man he is now can’t mock the grief that’s on Sayid’s face. He might not understand it, but he knows enough about grief to honor it. “Okay, Sayid. I’ll give it my best shot.”

Sayid nods, looking relieved. He brushes his hair back, combing through it with his fingers, visibly gathering himself together. “I must go,” he mutters.

“You – oh.” Sawyer’s not sure what to say. He thought they’d come so close to something else, that he finds himself disappointed in the prospect of Sayid leaving like this, no questions answered, nothing resolved. “Do you have to?”

“It would be for the best. My being here – it is a risk. An – endangerment to you.”

Sawyer bites his lip in annoyance because Sayid is talking in riddles again. “I don’t care,” he says.

“But I do.” Sayid walks purposefully back into the room and is slipping on his jacket by the time Sawyer follows him in.

Sawyer’s not sure what possesses him, but he reaches out and grabs Sayid by the arm and pulls him near, so he’s looking right down into his face. Something flashes in Sayid’s eyes, surprise and then heat, and it sparks an answering heat in Sawyer. “Stay,” he says, and there’s no mistaking his meaning.

For a moment he thinks Sayid will acquiesce, there’s so much desire in his face, in the angle of his body and the tension in his frame.

“No. I am sorry. I cannot.” His eyes are shuttered again, his expression cool. And then he smiles, a little bitter but teasing at the same time. “We should have made better use of our time on the island, you and I. I fear now it is a case of too little, too late.” He turns to go.

“Wait!” Sayid halts and faces him, an inquiring look on his face. “So that’s it? No explanation of what you’re doin’ here, why you came after me? You’re just gonna leave it at that?”

“Yes, Sawyer. I am going to leave it at that.”

Sawyer takes a breath, feeling almost panicked at the thought of Sayid vanishing without a trace, of not ever seeing him again.

“You stay alive too, Sayid,” he says. His voice is rough, but he pushes the words out. “I need you to do that for me.”

Sayid looks at him as if he’s drinking him in and storing the image away somewhere safe, his eyes moving over Sawyer’s face, lingering until Sawyer loses track of time, has no idea if a minute’s passed, or five, or thirty.

“I will give it my best shot,” Sayid says, and with one last, long look he turns and lets himself out, closing the door quietly behind him.

 


End file.
